Glass artist Joe Hobbs wears many hats for CLA

Suddenly Joe Hobbs’ job description has more hyphens than a British phone book.

In his new role as registrar/preparator/graphic designer/resident artist at the Centre for the Living Arts, Hobbs says he will document and catalog artwork at Space 301, deal with the artists, receive and ship the artwork, create posters and e-mails, and handle any design work required.

“And a normal day-to-day — fix a lot of stuff, move a lot of stuff,” he says. And whatever is needed at the Saenger Theatre as well.

“It’s a lot,” says the 35-year-old Hobbs, “but it’s my first 40-hour-a-week job. I’ve been doing the glass as a career the last 10 years, which is like 90 hours a week, twenty-four/seven.”

“Doing the glass” is Hobbs’ actual career, and he did it for a decade at Belmont Arts & Cultural Center in Pensacola, and for the past year he has been artist-in-residence for the Hot Shop @ Orange Beach Art Center. He will divide his work week into four 10-hour days at the CLA in Mobile, and Fridays and Saturdays in Orange Beach where he works with fellow glass artist Sam Cornman.

The Hot Shop will celebrate its one-year anniversary Aug. 20 and will be mentioned in the August issue of Southern Living magazine, according to Hobbs. He hopes the exposure will boost the tourist trade that was seriously suppressed by the Gulf oil spill.

Hobbs comes to the Centre for the Living Arts at an interesting time. Change is under way, and the is genuine excitement about the future of Space 301 and the Saenger Theatre.

A few weeks ago he had lunch with the CLA’s Melissa Morgan and Cindy Phillips, who drove to Pensacola to pick up the artwork for “(re)memory.”

They mentioned the opening for a registrar/preparator, and Hobbs was definitely interested. When he came to Mobile to install the show, he interviewed with development director Linda Mayson. They offered him the job almost immediately.

“I accepted and figured I’d try it out, y’know,” he says.

In addition to working with downtown Mobile’s most visible arts organization, Hobbs is excited about making connections at the University of South Alabama, which is poised to establish a glassblowing facility and a glass art curriculum.

He describes Space 301 as “inspirational” and looks forward to creating a studio on the third floor, where he will do much of his glass-prep work such as drawing and painting on glass.

“I was doing a lot of that before I went back to school,” Hobbs says, referring to his recent graduation from the University of West Florida. “I’m getting back into my own work, which I think is the most important work I’ve made so far.”

Hobbs’ work is on view in “(re)memory,” now showing in the windows of Space 301/Art Off Centre. The exhibit is a first for the artist, who had never created window installations. The work in “(re)memory” was created to be shown in a different space — which it was a few weeks ago in Artel Gallery’s new Pensacola location.

Hobbs will have another show of his work at the River Gallery in Chattanooga, Tenn., his place of birth. Although he was raised in Sonoma, Calif., Hobbs has family ties to Chattanooga and has traveled and worked in several venues including Atlanta. He was a glassblower there before he moved to Pensacola 10 years ago.

Hobbs says he likes the way his glass and mixed-media pieces are displayed at Art Off Centre.

"There’s like a sequential order, whichever way you walk,” he says. “Each little pocket is like its own little world, and I found that kind of interesting.”

The artwork is “based on memory and the collection, storage and disintegration of memory,” he explains. More than 75 “memories” are stored in the exhibit. One piece, titled “Episodic,” was inspired by the tentativeness of episodic memory, he says, such as the inability to recall what you had for breakfast.

“(Re)memory” was Hobbs’ BFA exit show at West Florida, where he graduated in May. He opened the show at Artel 10 days after the the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill started in the Gulf of Mexico. Visitors to Artel assumed that Hobbs created the artwork in response to the Gulf catastrophe.

It was an intriguing coincidence, he says, fueled by the saturation media coverage of the oil spill. He was gratified by the response.

“Even though the inspiration wasn’t the same, it was like viewers felt a direct connection with the work,” he says. “Even if that was not exactly my intention, something resonated.”